Their Fireheart

Chapter Thirty One

Cassian

By midafternoon, Aelin had signed all the documents the Master of the Bank brought over, officially washing her hands of the Keep and the horrid memories those walls contained. She'd rid herself of the enormous property with little care, saddling its new owners with the responsibility to care for it and the Guild - signing it over with nothing more than a few snide comments about leaving it to what was sure to be a bleak fate in their sorry hands.

Not only had Aelin tricked her way into inheriting a fortune that would rival that of a small country, but she also then nearly doubled it in the matter of hours with the sale - freeing herself from her responsibilities as the Queen of Assassins. Meanwhile, I still hadn't wrapped my mind around everything she must have done to accomplish that.

Though, if she had wanted to keep that title, I certainly wouldn't have complained.

When we finally left, I could tell we were all glad to turn our backs to the towering Keep. I for one, would gladly never set my eyes on the stone monstrosity ever again. And it wasn't because I'd had to witness my mate turn into that cruel, heartless version of herself, no -

No, I knew a thing or two about masks. About the necessity of them. Hell, the entire Night Court did. But I also understood, better than maybe anyone else here, the ways a brutal childhood could warp you, when the only person you could rely on was yourself. How it demanded you become something else - force you to build up impenetrable walls because if no one could reach you, no one could hurt you - how it taught you that sometimes being feared was the only way to keep yourself safe.

Nothing about the person she'd become today had scared me, had disgusted me. If anything, I only fell deeper in love with my little warrior.

To have survived what she had, and still have the capacity for kindness, for love? She really was the strongest of us all. Cauldron knew that if Rhysand hadn't shown up at the training camp when he did ... I doubt I'd even be a shadow of the male I was today.

But I couldn't deny I was thankful she could finally peel off that mask, that I could look my mate in her enchanting eyes and fucking beg her to admit to the thoughts I knew were running rampant in her too-clever mind. That had been the true hardship of witnessing her mask today, knowing I wasn't able to reach her to sort through the soul-splitting calamity of last night.

Now, I finally could. I'd get down on my knees if she needed me to - I couldn't care less about my dignity at this point. I just needed her to talk to me, to let me do what I needed to do to fix this, fix us.

I'd spent every moment since that interaction on the rooftop in a haze of needle-pricked terror, each thud of my heart carrying an echo of her words from last night.

Don't touch me like that.

The misery and pain etched into her rain and tear-soaked face - before she turned and fled from me - was imprinted in my mind, my heart, my fucking soul.

The night we'd spent scouring the city for sight or scent of her, only to return empty-handed and broken-hearted had been the worst kind of torture. The dark god himself couldn't come up with a crueler punishment. Except perhaps the moment when she'd finally returned - only to ignore us entirely.

It was a miracle I'd managed to keep it together at all, when I felt like I was drowning on dry land. I didn't think I was going to be able to endure it, but then, in the Keep -

There had been a fleeting spark of emotion in her beguiling eyes.

It was only a flash, but it was unmistakable. A split second when her mask had faltered, when she'd looked over at us with pain and sorrow brimming in her oceanic eyes, and then -